This, frankly, is a hard movie to rate just as a movie. It asks questions most of us today prefer to remain usasked. It raises various prejudices to the surface.
I first aw it on TV as a child. Less than ten years of age. I didn't understand it fully, but it none the less left a mark on me -- and a desire to see it again. Something I just recently did after some time searching for it by theme, not remembering the film's actual name.
It is easy to write off this film as part of some early `50s paranoia. But the fears and concerns of those times were not *just* paranoia, as an honest look at history reveals. Nor is the film shallow and one-sided. No, its storyline asks us ask questions of ourselves and of our values -- just as the film characters have to ask questions of themselves, and see contradictions in their own points of view.
Hollywood would never make this film today. The media would scream in anger, and some in the population would feel very threatened if some indi film maker did do so.
I like to ask myself questions. Yes, even when I am less than satisfied with the answers such question put in my mind -- even as just "possibilities."
So, again, this is a hard film to simply review. I wish more films fell into that category. Sometimes I'm simply sick and tired of all the 'easy answers' we are today expected to simply accept.
Worth a view? Absolutely!

This, frankly, is a hard movie to rate just as a movie. It asks questions most of us today prefer to remain usasked. It raises various prejudices to the surface.
I first aw it on TV as a child. Less than ten years of age. I didn't understand it fully, but it none the less left a mark on me -- and a desire to see it again. Something I just recently did after some time searching for it by theme, not remembering the film's actual name.
It is easy to write off this film as part of some early `50s paranoia. But the fears and concerns of those times were not *just* paranoia, as an honest look at history reveals. Nor is the film shallow and one-sided. No, its storyline asks us ask questions of ourselves and of our values -- just as the film characters have to ask questions of themselves, and see contradictions in their own points of view.
Hollywood would never make this film today. The media would scream in anger, and some in the population would feel very threatened if some indi film maker did do so.
I like to ask myself questions. Yes, even when I am less than satisfied with the answers such question put in my mind -- even as just "possibilities."
So, again, this is a hard film to simply review. I wish more films fell into that category. Sometimes I'm simply sick and tired of all the 'easy answers' we are today expected to simply accept.
Worth a view? Absolutely!

For a sci-fi movie, this had an extremely noticeable lack of effects. In an era with television and telephone, the US is trying to speak to Mars using not images or voices, but Morse code. A whole lot of pseudo-scientific gobbledygook comes out of Peter Graves, making an already action-less movie even duller. This amounts to a bunch of talking heads with heavily religious overtones smacking you in the face so hard you'd think they used a sledgehammer.

For a sci-fi movie, this had an extremely noticeable lack of effects. In an era with television and telephone, the US is trying to speak to Mars using not images or voices, but Morse code. A whole lot of pseudo-scientific gobbledygook comes out of Peter Graves, making an already action-less movie even duller. This amounts to a bunch of talking heads with heavily religious overtones smacking you in the face so hard you'd think they used a sledgehammer.

Surprisingly, an epistemological film. Ultimately anti-science, pro-Christianity, but developed in a way that causes the viewer to ask questions about how he knows or believes that which he knows or believes. There's a little Cold War drama thrown in, but it's merely backdrop, context.

Surprisingly, an epistemological film. Ultimately anti-science, pro-Christianity, but developed in a way that causes the viewer to ask questions about how he knows or believes that which he knows or believes. There's a little Cold War drama thrown in, but it's merely backdrop, context.

McCarthyesque scaremongering masquerading as sci-fi? A science fiction movie with virtually no science and precious little fiction it instead is a cheap shot at the evils of Nazi's and the Russians and how they threaten the average American and his way of life. This kind of propaganda has pervaded the minds of millions of people and amusingly the movie attempts to flip-flop the same dogma and shine a light back on itself.
The movie is either the most pandering indictment of mass hysteria being used to control the masses or a searing jibe at it's use, wrapped up so snug that it cant be accused of doing exactly that.

McCarthyesque scaremongering masquerading as sci-fi? A science fiction movie with virtually no science and precious little fiction it instead is a cheap shot at the evils of Nazi's and the Russians and how they threaten the average American and his way of life. This kind of propaganda has pervaded the minds of millions of people and amusingly the movie attempts to flip-flop the same dogma and shine a light back on itself.
The movie is either the most pandering indictment of mass hysteria being used to control the masses or a searing jibe at it's use, wrapped up so snug that it cant be accused of doing exactly that.

This is an early 50s Sci-Fi movie that will have you scratching your head.
Peter Graves stars as a scientist who sends a signal to Mars and gets an actual call back from real Martians. The Martians give Graves messages that send the world into a panic, apparently because we Earthlings are jealous of the the Martians' technology. World markets collapse, crime spikes, Labor Unions freakout (not surprising), etc. Graves also receives a proxy message from Mars, originally delivered by God. This message changes the world into a peaceful, religious place practically overnight. But hold on, the Russians have been eavesdropping so trouble is bound to ensue.
This movie contains absolutely no visuals of Martians, space battles or anything else that amounts to anything more than a left over stage prop. But somehow it almost works. Many will think that this is a thinly veiled commantary on McCarthyism. Others will sour on its overtly religious theme, and that's okay. I honestly can't decide what I think of it.

This is an early 50s Sci-Fi movie that will have you scratching your head.
Peter Graves stars as a scientist who sends a signal to Mars and gets an actual call back from real Martians. The Martians give Graves messages that send the world into a panic, apparently because we Earthlings are jealous of the the Martians' technology. World markets collapse, crime spikes, Labor Unions freakout (not surprising), etc. Graves also receives a proxy message from Mars, originally delivered by God. This message changes the world into a peaceful, religious place practically overnight. But hold on, the Russians have been eavesdropping so trouble is bound to ensue.
This movie contains absolutely no visuals of Martians, space battles or anything else that amounts to anything more than a left over stage prop. But somehow it almost works. Many will think that this is a thinly veiled commantary on McCarthyism. Others will sour on its overtly religious theme, and that's okay. I honestly can't decide what I think of it.

I know it was made in 1952 but its still just so bad, so Aliens, no bad special effects and no mars at all its all a bunch of talk. It was worth watching to see them bag the shit out of it on film sack, but it was just a bad movie made when movies were pretty bad.

I know it was made in 1952 but its still just so bad, so Aliens, no bad special effects and no mars at all its all a bunch of talk. It was worth watching to see them bag the shit out of it on film sack, but it was just a bad movie made when movies were pretty bad.

Pretty disgraceful Anti-communist and Christian propaganda, thinly disguised as a dry sci-fi drama. The second half descends into a religious reawakening and the collapse of communism, following preaching from God, who lives on Mars. The cast includes Peter Graves, Morris Ankrum, Walter Sande and Tom Keene.

Pretty disgraceful Anti-communist and Christian propaganda, thinly disguised as a dry sci-fi drama. The second half descends into a religious reawakening and the collapse of communism, following preaching from God, who lives on Mars. The cast includes Peter Graves, Morris Ankrum, Walter Sande and Tom Keene.